Fame. Wealth. Power.

The Gang King Gold Roger had all this and more. His dying words sent thousands to the streets. "You want my treasure? You can have it. I left it all in one place. Now you just have to find it"

People swarmed to the Grand Land, a mysterious stretch of land circling across the world. Despite mountains protecting the land from the outside world, and the general unpleasantness of the lands, humans have managed to make large towns in the Grand Land. They successfully settled there, in these amazing lands that often defy the very nature of law itself. But the settlers have to constantly deal with rogue gangs who are on their search for the One Piece, ravaging and plunder as they go.

But this story doesn't start there. It starts outside of the mountain range in the the East Land, with a young boy.

Monkey D. Luffy

Luffy shoved his pinkie finger up his nose, his red baseball cap with a giant yellow "L" on the front rested at an angle on his head. He slouch back on the brown couch and kicked his sandaled feet up onto the table, staring disinterestedly at the man in front of him as his finger moved around in a distinct 'I'm picking my nose' motion.

The man looked down at his office desk and sighed, a hand coming up to rub his hair. Looks like his Tuesday afternoon appointment actually arrived this time. He forced a smile onto his face. "Welcome back Luffy. Still having those dreams?"

"Yep." Luffy flicked a booger against the wall. The man winced. He'll have to get his secretary to clean that again. Because he sure as heck wasn't about to go anywhere near that green mess. The man scooted his chair back to lean down and rifle through some drawers. He grabbed a file an inch thick full of papers and plopped it on the desk. He opened it, and the paper-ladened side made a distinct thumping sound as it hit the desk. The man winced once more.

"So what was it about this time?" he asked, grabbing a pen and another piece of paper. At least he was going to get an interesting story out of this. Another one to add to the already enormous file. Ten year old Luffy sat up, excitement rushing into his voice.

"This time I dreamed that I got caught in a whirlpool! I kept spinning and spinning and spinning! It was so cool! I go soooo dizzy!"

The man scribbled it down. "Did you escape?"

"Of course!" Luffy jumped onto the couch, slightly bouncing on the cushions as he made energetic arm motions to go with the story. "I climbed into a barrel and lived! Then I met this weak kid named Coby and we beat up this ugly lady pirate and got in a boat and sailed away."

The man scratched his head, exasperated. "Luffy, you've had this same dream before how many times now?"

"Five." Luffy proudly held out four fingers. Then his face contorted and his hand dropped. "But it's not done." he grumbled, and slouched back down against the couch.

"What?" the man pushed up his glasses with the tip of his forefinger.

"The dream. It's not done. There is more after, but I can't remember. Something is blocking it." Luffy sighed. The man perked up, and scribbled more down. There was a block. Finally, something he could work with!

"Still not giving up on becoming a pirate?" he asked a couple moments later.

Luffy shook his head and scowled "Course not! It's my dream!"

The man mentally rolled his eyes. Where in the world did this little boy's admiration come from? Pirates were nowhere near here. They were a small group and only affected the people living by bodies of water. And there wasn't one of those in miles. The only bad things out there now were gangs. Usually small boys like Luffy wanted to join a gang, not a pirate crew.

Speaking of gangs. He placed down his pen and leaned forward, laying his elbows on his desk and clasping his hands together as he talked. "Luffy, I know you don't want to be here. I know you were against it from the beginning. I also know your grandpa forced you to come, and that is why you keep skipping out on our weekly meetings. But, for your safety, I'm going to have to cancel all your appointments for a while."

"Why?" Luffy asked, finger in nose once more.

The man sighed. The boy obviously didn't understand what he was saying, but continued onwards with his explanation. "There has been a gang spotting. Two, maybe three days off. They raided a nearby town, and the residents were nice enough to send us a warning. I can't remember which town or gang it was at the moment, but I do remember that the gang is suppose to be dangerous. They might skip our town, or they might not. And as per usual, the police have sent more officers. So, as not to gain your grandfather's wrath in case of injury, your appointments are canceled."

Luffy turned his head on its side. "Sooo I'm not coming here anymore?"

The man sighed. "Only for a while."

As usual, Luffy took it farther then it was. "Woohoo! I'm never coming back!" he cheered as stood on the couch and pumped his arms outwards, a huge grin on his face. He hopped of the furniture immediately, and headed for the door. Luffy pushed the glass door open with all his strength, flying through it without another thought.

"Wait! Luffy! I said for a while not-he's not listening." the man groaned and settled back into his chair. The door settled into its frame without a sound.


"Ahhhhh! Fresh air!" Luffy took in a deep breath and let it out. He cheerfully waved to the secretary as he passed her desk. She waved back and sent him a small smile, her attention quickly dropping pack to the papers on her desk.

Luffy pushed open the glass door- this door was funny. It had words printed on it that he didn't know. The words spelt C-H-I-L-D P-S-Y-C-H-I-A-T-R-I-S-T -to the outside world. To his surprise, something hit the door as he swung it open. He heard a loud crack followed by a swear word, and the door vibrated slightly. A police officer stumbled around it. The officer had a red splotch on his forehead, and was rubbing it as he viciously snarled at the small child.

"Oops. Sorry police-officer guy!" Luffy smiled to show he had no hard feelings. It was the officer's fault Luffy didn't get to slam the door all the way open as usual. But that's okay, he didn't know any better. The police officer glared, but made a wide circle around the kid just to be safe.

"Hmmm. Where to go? Where to go?" Luffy pondered as he headed down the sidewalk in the opposite direction of the policeman. "I could find a barrel to climb into. Nah, I do that enough times. Maybe I go check out my ship?" He suggested, then nodded to himself. "Yeah, that's sounds like a great idea! To my ship!"

He took off towards his house. It took a good couple minutes of running, and parkour that looked straight out of a cartoon, but eventually Luffy caught sight of his house. It was actually a mansion, courtesy of his grandpa. People always seemed surprised when Luffy showed them his house. He didn't know why.

But he wasn't exactly going home right now. He was going next door! There was a really cool abandoned old house there. That place had been there forever! Vines grew everywhere on it, and not an inch of the house escaped their green grasp. An fence had been constructed by the neighbors to block the view. Why they didn't tear the building down instead was another mystery.

However, parked in the long driveway was an old car. It was an old four seater, one whose original color was long forgotten. It was nice green color now, like the old pennies he always found in his pockets. But most importantly, it was Luffy's "ship". He had found it a couple years ago while doing some exploring, and he claimed it as his own. He hadn't named it yet. It hadn't felt right to.

Luffy climbed into the driver seat and spun the wheel, imitating the sounds of the ocean. If he closed his eyes, he could almost feel the sea breeze brushing against his face, the way it teased him as it brushed through his hair with its gentle arms. The warmth of the sun on his skin was always along side the wind, filling his body with energy and happiness. There were times where he swears he could smell the water, and if he licked his lips he could almost taste the salt. In Luffy's mind this car was not a car at all. It was a ship.

Well, more like a canoe actually.

He would get a better ship though. Luffy knew he would. It was only a matter of time. Suddenly bored, he gave the steering wheel one last rough spin. Sighing, he laid down in the front and stared at the flaky greenish ceiling with his arms under his head. His thoughts wandered to the dream man from before, and he frowned.

"The dream-man doesn't know what he's talking about." Luffy scowled. "Those aren't dreams. They're memories."

A/N: Hey guys! Thanks for making it through the intro and reading the actual story! I know that intros like that typically drive people away, so I hope the story was worth it! Sorry if anything was confusing. I wrote this when I was 14, 15, and when I checked back on it years later I even found some stuff confusing. If you have any questions, I'll happily answer any of them.

Please keep an eye out for any mistakes. I'm working on this with no beta, and with my old terrible writing I'm sure things slipped through. And there might be lots of them cause this story is going to be longer. I was impressed with my old self when it turned out to be over 20,000 words before I even made any edits. And my style back then was terrible, relying too much on the reader's imagination to see what I was seeing. And the chapters were so long. I split the original first chapter into three so it wouldn't be super long.

Anyways, thanks for reading! And if you enjoyed it that much, feel free to follow, favorite, or comment if you want! Thanks!